But all of that is just the start. This summer we’re unveiling a brand new Pando.com, with even more features, more events, and complete rebuild and redesign. Most people will have to wait until the summer to see the All New Pando — but today we’re giving 500 early adopting readers the chance to take a peek behind the curtain.

Today we’re launching the beta version of Pando Memberships. For a single annual fee of $250, members get a transferable VIP pass to all of our Pando Monthly events (in person, or via live streaming, plus the ability to watch again instantly) a subscription to the Pando Quarterly magazine (in print and digital, delivered anywhere in the world), an exclusive daily email containing advance previews of the next day’s Pando headlines — plus deep, deep discounts to all of our other events (for example: members can go to Southland for just $499, compared to the regular price of $1299).

Memberships will open to everyone when Pando.com relaunches properly in the Summer. But 500 of you (first come, first served) can sign up right now at a special discounted price of just $250 for an entire year (regular price is $300). You’ll get instant access to all the member benefits above — plus new features and benefits as we bring them online.)

So what’s the catch? And why are we only accepting 500 new subscribers at first?

The only catch is that we’re hoping beta subscribers will also help us test drive the all-new Pando.com before we roll it out to everyone later in the year. Members will get advance access to new functionality, features and community tools before the rest of the world, and will also be able to view pilots of some of our new video features, ebooks and all that good stuff. We want to keep the number of members controllable while we fix any bugs and decide what works and what doesn’t. There’s no obligation for beta members to provide suggestions or bug reports but any feedback will be very much appreciated.

Beta registration opens right…. now — and closes when we hit 500 members. (If you’d like to buy more than one membership, email us for bulk pricing info.)

See you in the members’ area!

(Note for former NSFWCORP subscribers: Look out for an email very soon explaining how to transfer over your membership.)

Facebook has introduced Scrapbook, a new feature that allows parents to share and collect images of their children in one place without requiring them to worry about tagging their kids’ face with each other’s names just to make sure they don’t miss what the other person has posted. [Source: Facebook]

“For all the clumsy rhetorical lip service [former Yahoo News head] Guy Vidra pays to The New Republic’s hallowed intellectual traditions, this is what his vision of a nimble digital news product finally translates into: a vaguely journalistic veneer strategically designed to conceal a rancid interior of ‘elevated’ advertising.”

Indian e-commerce company Flipkart is said to be raising $600 million in its latest bid to compete with Amazon. The company is also said to have garnered a higher valuation with this funding round — quite the feat, considering it was previously valued at around $11.5 billion. [Source: The Economic Times]

Here comes another unicorn: Sprinklr, a New York-based marketing company, has raised $46 million at a $1.17 billion valuation. The funds will be used to help the 700-person company expand its marketing platform. [Source: Fortune]

Curator, the tool Twitter created so the media could find and share tweets with its audience, is now available to the public. Because if there’s anything people wanted to see more of, it’s tweets randomly inserted into blog posts, television spots, and other forms of media. [Source: TechCrunch]

A court in France has decided not to ban Uber’s low-cost services until the country’s highest appeals court, or its supreme court, weigh in on the constitutionality of a new transport law. [Source: The Wall Street Journal]

Tinder is refocusing on its spam-fighting efforts in the wake of reports that movie studios are using the service to promote their movies, scammers are attempting to steal information via the app, and pranksters have created tools that trick heterosexual men into flirting with each other. [Source: The Verge]

Uber offers drivers whose accounts have been deactivated a choice: attend a class that requires them to pass an exam, or take a class that doesn’t. The latter has been informed by Uber employees, and the company has sent thousands of drivers to it, according to a report from BuzzFeed. Why is that a problem? Because Uber isn’t supposed to provide its drivers with formal training; doing so makes them bona fide employees, not independent contractors. [Source: BuzzFeed]

Flipboard users will now be able to collect articles and share them via private magazines visible only to members of certain groups. The feature is aimed at students working in the same class, companies sharing press coverage, and other groups that might want an easy way to share Web pages with each other without having to use public tools like Facebook or Twitter. [Source: Flipboard]

T-Mobile has tasked its customers with creating a real-world coverage map that makes it easier to tell where its service works and where it doesn’t. Instead of guessing at where its customers will get service — which is what other carriers do, the company claims — it’s asking people to verify its predictions so it can be more honest with consumers. [Source: T-Mobile]